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Feeling your competition close in on you is stressful, but it
also gets your adrenaline pumping. It makes you focus more
intently, and ultimately, pushes you to create a better product.

“Competition is the greatest thing that can happen in business.
It’s the best thing,” said Doreen Lorenzo, the
president of consumer-product invention company Quirky, at a
panel discussion on the sharing economy in New York City last
night. “Otherwise you get stale, you get fat, you get slow.”

The panel featured leading executives from sharing-economy front
runners, including the transportation company Uber, accommodation rental service
Airbnb, and crowdsourced
recruiting company RecruitiFi. As the sharing
economy expands and grows, so too, has the number of competitors
in the space. For example, Uber now shares the ride-hailing
technology space with players like Lyft and Sidecar.

Feeling the breath of your competitors on your neck is good for
you. In a market without other startups nipping at your heels,
you begin to gain a sense of false confidence, Lorenzo says. “The
best thing that can happen to you is a competitor enters your
space and then you think, ‘Oh, shit, I have got to do
something.’”

For entrepreneurs creating a new industry -- one that may even
ask consumers to change their behavior -- your competition can
also be your teammate in a counterintuitive sort of way, said
Wrede Petersmeyer, the New York City manager for Airbnb. Just
look at the sharing economy: Not long ago, the idea of sharing a
car or an apartment with a stranger would have been seen as odd
-- and in many parts of the country, it still is. But more
companies entering the space has helped shift that social norm.
“Our biggest competition in these sharing economies is not
necessarily each other, but the misconceptions about the sharing
economy,” said Petersmeyer.

To new, nervous sharing-economy entrepreneurs, Petersmeyer tells
them to relax about the competition -- even welcome it. “You need
to sort of embrace your competitors. They are out there
convincing who you haven’t talked to yet that what you are trying
to do is not a weird thing.”

It’s a delicate balance, though. Once you have joined forces with
fellow sharing economy entrepreneurs to work to change public
perception, then you have to go back to thinking of yourself and
making your own product the best available, said Petersmeyer.